A Status Report on Dick Cheney’s Heart

• A certain analysis of spinal fluid can predict Alzheimer’s with 100 percent accuracy, in some cases. Still, debate about whether to inform patients of their likelihood of developing an untreatable, incurable disease is an ongoing point of contention within the medical community. [The New York Times]

• Former vice-president Dick Cheney has been released from Virginia’s Inova Fairfax Heart and Vascular Institute, where he had been recovering heart surgery. [Associated Press]

• An estimated 702 people perished in a mudslide in China’s Gansu province. There are also hundreds of reported injuries and still hundreds more who are reported missing. [CNN]

• The personal incomes of residents of an overwhelming majority of metropolitan areas fell this year—New York City among them. [The Wall Street Journal]

• The designated Web site of Fox News is not a popular Internet destination amongst its viewers. At least, according to Mediaite, it’s less of an attraction than the corresponding Web sites of CNN and MSNBC. [Mediaite]